Wish I May
by firewings86
Summary: "In Love and War" followup. Korra confronts Asami about their previous encounter. More Korrasami. :P


**Okay, I got peer-pressured into writing this. :P Sooo here you lovely, lovely people are :D. Personally I don't like this one as much, but eh, I wrote it so HERE IT IS. This is the last one in this little story-bubble, though, okay. For real this time. XD I might publish some drabbles or something later, since I do love my Korrasami.**

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Korra feels like she's been standing in this hallway staring at that stupid flimsy door for hours. She hates this. She's a decisive person. She takes what she wants, gets where she needs to be. Sneaking around and agonizing and getting all worked up? No way.

_That's it. I'm doing this_. She flings the door open and then cringes at the snapping noise it makes as it slams against the wall. A less than graceful entrance, even for her. _Shit_. Asami's waking up. She makes a small, muffled sound and rolls over and Korra panics on the inside. Maybe it's not too late to just shut the door before Asami takes her sleep mask off, make a run for it and pretend this never happened. No, no, that won't work. This conversation's going to happen sooner or later. Might as well get it out of the way.

Korra's still standing there biting her lip when Asami pulls her velvet mask up and rubs her eyes. The shutters are open and she looks like a china doll in the moonlight.

"Korra?" She sounds curious, but not shocked. She takes it all in stride, her wrists crossed neatly over her lap, her hair looking only slightly less perfect than it does during the day. Korra's stomach clenches. This is the kind of thing that had her thinking Asami was prissy at first, but she keeps on defying expectations. Someone who wears a fancy silk nightgown is supposed to at least get annoyed at being woken up in the middle of the night.

On that note, it bothers her how calm and perfect Asami is, all the time. Who's actually like that? No one. It makes her feel all itchy and hot. Almost like she wants to grab her and shake her and yell at her to get mad for once, but then the idea of being that close to her again is uncomfortable too. Korra can't win here.

"Yeah, uh, it's me." Asami waves her in. She shuts the door, puts on a brave face.

"Is everything okay?" Asami kicks the covers off and goes to swing her long, perfect legs off the side of the bed.

"No, no," Korra says, "everything's fine. You don't have to get up. I just…" She gropes for the right words. _Dammit_. She's so bad at talking. Taking action, kicking bad guy ass, great. This? Not so much. The last time she tried to have a talk like this, she blurted everything in her head at Mako and it turned out… not so great, but if she doesn't bring it up at all, it'll drive her crazy forever. "I just, um, wanted to make sure, you know, we're cool and all. Everything's… good. Between us. No misunderstandings or hard feelings or anything."

There has to be something else behind the… behind what happened earlier. Asami's still mad about Mako and was playing a trick on her. It's the only possible explanation. She's messing with her head for revenge. She's trying to make her a cheater like she did to Mako at the stadium. No one is this nice all the time. Two words: emotional sabotage.

Asami clears her throat. "Yeah, everything's fine." Awkward.

"Okay, um, good." So awkward. "Asami, we're friends, right?" That question sounds so stupid. Why does she suck so much at this stuff?

Asami smiles, looks down at her hands in her lap. "Of course," she says. That shy look drives Korra crazy. Asami must be a fantastic actress. The way her eyes slide down at just the right speed, the tiny huff of breath when she tilts her chin sideways so her hair falls into her face—that has to be fake.

"Okay. I just wanted to make sure, since earlier I thought maybe there was some mistake or something, since friends don't usually—"

"You mean you want to know why I kissed you." Asami fidgets with the hem of her blanket. Korra swallows and nods. "I'm sorry. I guess I just got a little carried away. Pretty… embarrassing. It won't happen again."

Heat creeps into Korra's cheeks. She scratches at her arm, feeling suspicious and like a total idiot at the same time. Asami can't be serious… can she?

"No, it's not that," she says. "It's just… I'm a girl."

That little smile again. It sets Korra so on edge she feels like she's going to either hit something or be sick. She wants to firebend the butterflies in her stomach to death. Oh, wait. She's not a firebender anymore.

"I noticed," Asami says. _Is that all she's going to say_?

Korra can't wrap her head around this whole situation. Hopefully no one else will ever find out. Mako would flip. Mako? Maybe she should break up with him. Wait, break up with him for what? For Asami? Even if she did like Asami that way—which she doesn't—it can't happen. It's wrong. And crazy.

"I'm pretty sure girls aren't supposed to kiss each other," she says.

"Says who?" Asami looks up again, unnervingly cool and confident. Korra's knees go weak. Asami is the only person she's ever met who genuinely makes her nervous for no reason. _Who is this girl and how does she do this to me_?

"Well… I… I don't—"

"Look, it's okay. I get it. It's weird. We can pretend like it never happened if that's what you want."

"No! Er, what I mean is, I really don't even know what I want."

Asami sighs and motions her over, edges over in the bed to make room and pats the spot next to herself. Korra eyes her. Asami laughs.

"Not like that, silly. Come on, just sit for a minute." Korra's pajamas rustle as she sits cross-legged on top of the covers. "I was always kind of sad we never got a chance to really hang out, you know? Just us girls. I thought you just didn't like me at first, and then I realized about Mako…" She shrugs and pulls her knees up to her chin, her nightgown sliding up her thighs. Korra's eyes dart away.

"I still don't get it," she blurts. "Why do you like me? You're so perfect and I'm so… not. Especially now without my bending."

Asami shakes her head. "I'm a lot less perfect than you think."

"I doubt that."

"No, really. Actually, sometimes I feel like if I were more perfect, my dad wouldn't've… Maybe he'd've let mom go if I'd been enough for him." _Well, this conversation took a turn out of Uncomfortable Field straight into the Forest of Eternal Misery_. Korra wonders why the world seems intent on screwing over everything she cares about. Her bending. Lin. Her friends. In what world is it okay for someone like Asami to not feel good enough?

"That's crazy," she says. "No offense, but your dad is an asshole. It has nothing to do with you."

Asami shrugs again. "I know, but people can't help how they feel. Like you. No matter how many times I tell you you're special even without your bending, you aren't going to believe me, are you?" Asami has her pegged. She chuckles and shakes her head. "See."

"I guess I can't be too hard on him," Korra says. "Your dad. He did something right, raising someone as nice as you."

"You think I'm nice?"

Korra nods. Asami grins and hides her face in her knees. Korra catches herself melting. Maybe it's not an act. Maybe someone as poised and elegant as Asami can still be shy and self-conscious. Who knew?

"Maybe, um…" _I can't believe I'm saying this_. "Maybe we could try it one more time. Just to be sure." Asami switches gears from shy to coquettish in milliseconds.

"Try what one more time?" she says, looking up at Korra through her long, dark eyelashes, her cheek still resting on her knees. Her eyes are innocent; her voice begs to differ. _She's going to make me do it, isn't she?_ Asami just stares, unmoving.

_Fine_. Korra looks down, fumbles, takes a second to work up the courage. She touches Asami's face. It's frustrating how soft it is. Her own hands probably feel like sandpaper in comparison—how embarrassing—but Asami doesn't seem to mind. She picks her head up, watches her.

Korra hesitates, inches from her face. It was so much easier when it was Mako, crazy impulse, throwing caution to the wind and not caring what happened after. She wanted to kiss him right then even if he never spoke to her again because of it. Is that the difference here? That it matters how Asami feels after? That everything has to go right this time?

She can feel Asami's breath on her lips. Seconds drag like hours full of Asami, her perfume, her long, slender fingers on Korra's knee.

When Korra finally closes the gap between them, the touch is so light she can't be sure it actually happened. Her heart won't stop racing.

She kisses her again, harder this time, and Asami reaches up to clutch at her nightshirt. The knuckles against her collarbone spur her on. She loses some control, shifts to sit on her knees so she can press down, be the taller one for once. Her fingers slide from Asami's cheeks to her neck.

They mesh seamlessly, work in a rhythm, open their mouths a little wider. Asami's tongue runs across Korra's bottom lip. Her stomach jumps. This is uncharted territory in so many different ways.

They'll be in so much trouble if they get caught, and somehow that just fans the flames. Korra rises to meet Asami's challenge, pushes her tongue against hers, tugs her lip between her teeth. It's getting harder and harder to breathe. Her chest is on fire.

Asami crawls up against her. Korra buries a hand in her hair and kisses her neck, pushes her nightgown straps off her shoulders. She trails her fingertips across bare skin. Asami's breathing shallows, and she makes little feminine-sounding gasps and moans at every touch.

Then Asami shoves her knee between Korra's thighs, hooks her arms tight around her neck. Korra's dizzy. She can barely process everything that's going on.

"Wait," she whispers, pulling her lips off Asami's collarbones. She backs to the edge of the bed, clamps her legs shut and shakes her head. Too much. It's too much, too fast, but her brain and her mouth won't cooperate well enough for her to say so. Instead, she stares dumbly while Asami reaches after her, looking hurt and confused and alone. "I can't do this," she says. Her bare feet hit the floor with a thud. She feels like she's underwater and she can't bend her way to the surface. The door is the only escape.

"Korra." There's something horrifyingly fragile in Asami's voice, something that forces Korra to turn around against her will and see her pulling her nightgown straps back up as she scrambles off the bed. _Dammit._ Korra hates feeling out of control. She hates that Asami says "Jump," and she says "How high?"

Hating it doesn't mean she can stop herself from jumping. She stands on tip-toes to kiss Asami good night, long and slow. She looks so scared, her eyes wide, her chest heaving and her hair rumpled and frizzy for once. Korra nods, an answer to all the unspoken questions on that beautiful face. Asami nods back, slow, understanding. Korra cracks a smile.

Life is still wrong. Her bending is gone. She still feels useless and hopeless and painfully ordinary, but… less so, now, somehow. A tiny part of her world is in equilibrium. It's precarious, but any peace—cool fingers on hot cheeks, a hug at the door—is better than what she had before.

And that's when it hits her: better. Things are better than they were before. It'll get better, and that makes all the difference in the world.

"Good night," Asami says through the crack in her door.

Korra closes her eyes and remembers to breathe.


End file.
